


Sleeping

by thinkpink20



Category: British Comedian RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-24
Updated: 2012-02-24
Packaged: 2017-10-31 16:25:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/346121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thinkpink20/pseuds/thinkpink20





	Sleeping

David is reading the paper, trying to stay awake. He's aware he has half of the Guardian letter's page imprinted on the soft pads of his fingers, but he's too tired to get up and wash his hands. He also suspects he has a smear on his nose from where he scratched it earlier, but the mirror is simply too far away. 

And besides, he's on his own. No one to see his smeary newspaper-face, so he just concentrates on keeping his eyes open for another hour or two at least.

Judging when is a respectable time to go to bed after a night-shoot is a difficult thing; too early and you wake at 5am, throwing your body clock further out, and too late and you can miss it. Once he pushed it until midnight and then lay there for nearly three hours like some sort of over-dosed junkie, unable to close his eyes. This is the part of _Peep Show_ he hates, night-shoots. Though thankfully this time they hadn't been on the moors in the middle of nowhere, at least.

The sound of the doorbell forces him upright, and for a second David looks around a little bit bewildered. Maybe he dropped off there for a second. 

Pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, he goes to the door. Through the patterned glass panes he can see it's dark and dull already outside; barely seven o'clock and already grey. It's probably going to bucket down, definitely no longer summer time or anything that can pass for it.

"Hello," Rob says, when David opens the door.

"Bloody hell, you sound dreary."

"Esme's teething."

As though this explains everything, David steps aside and lets Rob in. He toes off his trainers because he knows David appreciates that sort of thing and they go through into the living room together, both sorts of shadows of men, defeated by lack of sleep.

"D'you want a coffee?" David asks. A shot of caffine at this time would be ludicrous of course, knocking out the sleep-awake balance but he offers it anyway. Rob looks like he needs it.

"I'll have tea, if you've got it."

Whilst boiling the kettle, David tries not to think too much about how odd this is - Rob doesn't really just 'drop by' usually. It's not even that he's married now with a baby, he never really _did_ ever 'drop by'. David isn't the type who _likes_ people dropping by, he appreciates well-scheduled visits and meetings planned in advance and Rob knows this about him and understands him well enough to never really cross those boundaries. So for him to just turn up at random suggests there must be something seriously out-of-place.

"I thought you might need the biscuits," David says, dropping a packet of Hobnobs into Rob's lap as he puts the chipped black Doctor Who mug Rob usually uses on the table infront of him.

"Do I look that bad?" Rob asks.

"Looks like a three biscuit problem," David replies, and they share a brief grin. 

The silence that settles between them as they sit side-by-side on the sofa is a comfortable one, passing Hobnobs back and forth until Rob eventually speaks through a mouthful of tasty, oaty goodness.

"Abi sent me out of the house."

David makes sure he swallows politely before he speaks. "Sounds like an episode of _Terry and June."_

"Apparently I get grumpy when I'm tired."

David tries not to smile. "Oh, do you really?" He lays the sarcasm on thick.

"Piss off," Rob replies quietly, good naturedly.

Then an idea sparks in David's half-asleep brain and he's up off the sofa, pushing the biscuits back into Rob's lap. "Hold these, I've got just the thing to cheer you up."

He roots through the DVD collection until - 

_"Jeeves and Wooster?"_ Rob does actually manage to raise a smile.

"Got it last week, ordered it from Amazon. The boxset."

David slips the disc into the player and then goes back to the sofa. As soon as he sits, Rob takes the DVD case from him, starts reading the back. The atmosphere around him has lifted, less like a gloomy cloud already. David tries not to feel too proud - it was probably more down to Fry and Laurie than him.

"Which one have you put in?" Rob asks.

"The cow creamer, of course."

They once spent an entire night in Cambridge persuading some long-since disappeared aquaintance that the cow creamer tale was Wodehouse at his irreverant best. Pure genius.

"God, I love this insane, pointless madness," Rob says, slipping the boxset onto the coffee table in front of him. He sounds less tense, more blissful now. David thinks this is a job well done. 

"Me too," he replies.

Bertie is barely on the drive up to Totleigh Towers when David feels a weight settle on his shoulder. He glances down to where Rob is now resting against him fast asleep, and he feels his own eyes drooping. It's not yet eight, so he knows he's chancing the 5am wake up if he goes now but... well, he can't resist. 

The remote falls out of his slack hand a moment or two later as he leans into the warmth of Rob and settles, his eyes flickering in REM sleep. By the time they both wake up they'll be much more _curled,_ rather than leaning. Embarrassingly, delightfully, happily _curled._

But that can just be explained away by the night-shoot, obviously.


End file.
